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Again!

Chels grabbed her arm, twisting it, bringing the smaller girl down to her knees with a pained yelp, but Warrick was a great, rumbling, all consuming presence in her mind. He shut out the pain, the crowd, everything but the taste of his rage, his support, and the woman she was facing.

<YOU CAN WIN!>

Jerking her arm free hurt, but she managed to free her hand, and as she turned she brought both fists up and around, driving knuckles and spikes into Chels' sternum for a double shock.

This was her validation. She craved it.

HP: 1
DMG: 4

Chel felt it shatter through her entire body, each shard of glass cutting all the more deep. She'd had her shield broken plenty of times before, sure. It was in the job description. This was different.

Her knees buckled and she fell in the sand. "Mercy, mercy," she said tiredly. "You win." Finally she looked up, smile pasting across her face. "Good match! You had me on my toes there." She wiped the sand off her face. "I'm gonna get out of here before my hair is literally made of sand." Dyed hair + sand = a bad time.

She then began walking towards the rim of the arena, keen on getting a shower.

Nevada stood up, looking besides her where Evan was, HOW EVEN DID HE GET THERE.

"Hi Evan." She smiled at the sun hunter. "Bye Evan." Then hopped down to go get Chelsea.

"Hey there cutie." Nevada followed after the sun huntress quietly. "It was a close match hun."

Chels began to fall and Peyton reached out to catch her by the arms, slow the descent, and as she did she caught that smile, and it brought an answering one to pale pink lips. "You're really brutal," she offered, letting her go as she got back to her feet and excused herself.

It made the other trainee frown after her, but she let her go, and instead her gaze slipped to the crowd, to Evan, whom she regarded with narrowed eyes, and then past him to Jordan, then Taym and his so serious expression. She waited for him to smile, to nod, but he did none of that, simply looked back at her.

It was entirely too different to his reaction to the finale of her last spar, and she turned away first, eyes dropping to the sand before sweeping up to Solomon.

People were coming down to collect Chels, to help her away, and Peyton stood alone in the sand, suddenly tired. The entirety of the match was creeping up on her, and she felt how weak her legs felt, how numb her knuckles felt as she let warrick return to the twin golden bands that circled her thumbs.

Finally, exhausted, she dropped as well to kneel between the dunes.

A pat on the head? Nevada frowned, bring her hand up as if that wasn't what she was expecting.

But considering it was the first loss in the tournament for Chelsea, the girl was probably upset.

And Nevada could only thing of one thing to do, running past the girl and frowning at her and standing her ground.

"Chelsea last name unknown sun hunter." She said in her best mom like voice, and regardless if the sun hunter wanted it or not, reached out to hug her. "It's okay Chelsea. You wanna a drink from my secret stash?" Well some people needed a shot okay.

Losing was hard to deal with.

"But don't tell me you want to be alone..." Nevada frowned up at the girl, concern clearly on her face. "It's worse when you're alone."

While Taym didn't jump the rope, Solomon did, sliding down into the sand where Peyton was resting and hoisting her up in his arms and swinging her around once before he fell into the sand with her, grinning.

"that was a - Augh, ugh, hold on.." he lifting the visor enough to slip his hand underneath it to brush the sand out from under it (and out of his eyes) before patting it back down and trying again. "As I was trying to say before your arena thwarted me, that was a close match!"

He watched Solomon and Peyton, and, reassured that she had someone to congratulate her, he absently passed the unlit cigarette from one side of his mouth to the other, then turned to go.

Strong arms picked her up, swinging her around before settling her on a familiar lap. It made Peyton squeak, startled, before she she curled her fingers into the front of his shirt and settled comfortably. Smiling tiredly as Solomon started to speak, then had to battle with a bit of sand in his eyes before finishing. It made her chuckle, and she rested her head against his shoulder. "It was really close. One good hit from her and I would have been done." Her shield had been trashed, she knew she'd been on the brink of a lose.

Letting go of his shirt, she reached for his hand, small fingers sliding over tanned skin. "I couldn't have done it without Warrick, he was pushing me at the end." His voice, his encouragement, had been enough to drive her forward. "Or with out you guys. Chelsea had so many people here supporting her, it was discouraging, but then I saw Jordan and Taym, and you." Her lips twitched, she sounded relieved, but tired. There was a distinct thread of pride in her voice that gave it an airy, light quality.

Three matches was beginning to wear on her. It was probably wearing on anyone that had made it this far. At least they were all moving forward on equal footing.